Darfur Case Studies

Case Study: Adwa

Adwa is a small town originally of 7,000-8,000 people about 50 kilometres north of Nyala, swollen by several tens of thousands of people displaced from rural areas. On 28 November 2004, government armed forces and Janjawid (1) came into the area in 4x4 vehicles and seized 19 men aged between 21 and 86 from the Daju and Fur ethnic groups. It is not known where they are; whether they were arrested or abducted. Families and lawyers have visited numerous known detention centres but have been unable to locate those detained. Both the Sudanese army and the Janjawid are known to hold detainees in military camps, but lawyers and family do not have access to those held and no information is available about who is held. Other detainees – also arrested by the army or Janjawid and also "disappeared" - are feared to have been extrajudicially executed.

Two days later, on 30 November at 6am, a large force of more than 600 armed men, reported to be from the army and the Janjawid, on horses and camels and in about 20 vehicles, attacked the village. They looted animals and property and killed people. The numbers of those killed were said to be between 90 and 140. AU monitors who flew over the area just after the attack reportedly saw about 100 bodies. AU monitors who came to investigate the attack the following day came under fire and a Chadian ceasefire monitor was shot in his right shoulder. When the AU at last gained access to the area the monitors found only 16 bodies, later finding a further four. Local people claimed that bodies were buried by the attacking forces in order to hide them from investigators. Thousands of people fled, mostly to neighbouring SLA-controlled (2) areas around Duma and Juruf. UN personnel who interviewed those who have fled were told that 17 women had been raped in the attack. The village is now deserted.

Case Study: Tawila

Tawila has become infamous as a town attacked by the army and Janjawid on 28 February 2004, where scores of women and girls, many in schools, were gang-raped. In November some of its original population had come back and, like all towns, it is also swollen by thousands of displaced people from rural areas. On 22 November it was again attacked, this time by the SLA . The causes of the attack, which came less than a fortnight after the SLA had signed the Humanitarian Agreement committing themselves to observe the April 2004 ceasefire and not to target civilians, are unclear: SLA leaders have said that it was because of anger at the weakness of Security Council Resolution 1574 on Darfur; and in response to government attacks on displaced in Kalma camp. However, the World Food Program said there had been skirmishes between government forces and the SLA on 18-19 November around the market in Tawila market.

The SLA focused their attack on the town’s police stations, killing 22 policemen; but an unknown number of civilians were also reportedly killed, including one doctor from the hospital, apparently wounded and left to bleed to death. The Sudanese armed forces sent in an Antonov plane which dropped 36 bombs, including one bomb 50 metres from a feeding centre run by an aid organization, Save the Children. Forty-five humanitarian workers were airlifted out of the town by the AU. The SLA moved out of the town the day after their attack and government forces returned, but it was reportedly some days before the AU monitors were allowed to enter.

There were more than 40,000 displaced people sheltering in the town who fled to neighbouring villages. About 16,000 went to Thabet, where there was fighting on 7-8 December, causing them to flee again, and more than 11,000 to Abu Shouk camp for the displaced near al-Fasher. People in the surrounding villages of Janjonat and Tabiba near the Kossa Hills, about 15km north of Tawila, were attacked by Janjawid on 28 November, and about 1,500 displaced fled to Saraf Aya. There government attacks forced them and the aid organisation Médecins sans Frontières out of the village and they had to flee again. Thus the repercussions of the SLA attack on Tawila lasted for weeks after. It affected not only the 40,000 who fled from place to place; as a result of the attack some 300,000 displaced could not receive any food because of the insecurity in the whole area. Three weeks after the attack, although the AU monitors instituted 24-hour "confidence-building patrols", few other former displaced had returned to the town.

Case Study: Al-Jeer Camp

The police have forcibly removed IDPs (3) from many camps, bulldozing their shelters and compelling them to leave. The Sudanese government often says that these removals are planned, but almost invariably they take place with force and at the middle of the night. At 3am on 2 November, 100 police attacked al-Jeer IDP camp in Nyala, beating hundreds of displaced people, reportedly tying them up and bundling them into 15 trucks to be taken to another camp, al-Sherif, several kilometres away. Others staying in al-Jeer camp fled to the town of Nyala.

After the first attack on al-Jeer camp on 3 November the UN Secretary-General’s special envoy to the Sudan, Jan Pronk, said:

"the government has told the internally displaced persons that it was happening in close consultation with the United Nations and with nongovernmental organizations, which is not the case. This is in flagrant violation of international humanitarian law and of the agreements reached with the government on the modalities of return and relocation. It has to stop not only in El Geer but as a policy, and the people have to be brought back to the place where they were forced away from."

During the night of 10 November there were two further separate attacks on al-Jeer camp, shortly after midnight and at 5am. Four carloads of police shot bullets into the air and threw teargas into tents. They beat up scores of residents, telling them that they had to leave the camp. The deputy chief of the camp, Shaikh Taher Hassaballah, was beaten up and arrested. The police then bulldozed shelters, ignoring the protests of representatives of the UN, the AU and international aid agencies present during the attack. Journalists also came under fire. At least 33 displaced were taken into custody, as well as one American journalist. The displaced were severely beaten in custody before being released on bail. They were charged in relation with "crimes against the state". It is not known whether charges against them will be upheld. Notwithstanding Jan Pronk’s protests at the first attack, the Sudanese authorities felt confident enough to repeat the attack on the same camp, in front of international media.

Case Study: Kalma

Kalma is a huge camp 15 km south of Nyala, in which displaced people continue to seek refuge, constantly swelling its numbers. NGOs working in Kalma estimate that some 100,000 displaced live there. The camp is situated on private land, adding to the fear that the Sudanese security forces may at any time use this as an excuse to clear people from the area. This was done to displaced people in al-Meshtel camp near Al-Fasher the night before the visit of UN Secretary-General, Kofi Annan to Darfur, and in al-Jeer Camp.

Since Kalma was opened, the displaced sheltering there have been constantly harassed by the police. The situation has often been tense; in July and August a group of displaced lynched an Arab attending a humanitarian course, accusing him of being one of those who attacked villages. Camp residents have often protested, sometimes violently, against attempts to force or bribe residents to return home to areas they regard as unsafe; scores have been arrested and many beaten up, inside or outside Nyala police station.

As the situation became more and more insecure, thousands of newly displaced people fled to Kalma camp. Sudanese government officials considered that the camp was already too large and increased their pressure on residents to go back to their homes. At one time they arrested four sheikhs telling them that "Anyone who attempted to stop returns would be shot". On the night of 13-14 November, the police shot at displaced persons in Kalma camp in Nyala, wounding at least six persons, including an eight-month-old baby and reportedly killing two displaced persons: Ishaq Musa Adam Harun (15 years old) and Adam Abdel Aziz, (32 years old). The police version is that they were shooting at rebels who infiltrated the camp.

Ten days later, on 21-22 November there was an attack on the police post in the camp, reportedly from SLA sympathizers within the camp, killing four policemen and three of the attackers. IDPs were arrested in several groups by police and security following this attack: a group of 28, a group of nine and a group of five, which included two children. All were charged with various offences, some carrying the death penalty, including murder, "waging war against the State", or "incitement to rebellion". IDPs told lawyers who visited them in prison that they had their hands and feet tied and then they were severely beaten into confessing the killings of policemen; according to them, policemen were killed in a shooting among police, resulting from a disagreement. All but seven of these IDPs have been released on bail.

(1) Janjawid – government-supported militia. ( Back)
(2) SLA – Sudan Liberation Army. (Back)
(3) IDPs – internally displaced persons. ( Back)